Jeff Propes Email and Phone Number

Offering consulting services to businesses who need or want Linux and open source, but don't know how it fits in to their environment. I help fill the knowledge gap and assist translation of their requirements into Linux-speak that engineers and sysadmins use. I specialize in hybrid environments, like Linux/Active Directory integration.

I function as a subject matter expert on all things Linux and a security-conscious provider of systems knowledge. I engage in "development archaeology", which is to say discovery and documentation of existing systems and processes for which there is no documentation and tribal knowledge is scarce or scattered. From this documentation, I produce automation to replace very old bespoke pet systems with reliable and testable cattle. We are heavily invested in Saltstack, salt-cloud, and Salt idioms, but the tooling could readily be expressed in other configuration management idioms.I developed provision-to-purpose automation using VMware, Saltstack, and Salt Cloud. It clones a new VM from the correct template in VMware, alters VM parameters & network config to match the requested role, and assembles it in the build VLAN. It waits for a human in IT to confirm the build/ticket, assign it to the correct VLAN, and turn the system on. At startup, the VM checks in with the salt master and requests "firstboot" provisioning which applies highstate, subscribes the system to Active Directory, and initiates role-specific provisioning (if defined). In the near future, we will add additional automation to remove the human step for low visibility development and testing environments, or if the human initiating the build is qualified to complete the middle steps.I helped shepherd overlapping transitions from physical systems to virtual ones built on VMware 6 (now 6.5), CentOS 6 to CentOS 7, a facilities migration, and moving headquarters. All of this occurred within a four month time period.

Go-to systems guy serving in multiple roles as sysadmin, devops, and systems engineering. Programmatically assembled OVAs as deliverable products for clients. Rebuilt tooling and improved highly customized Yocto-based systems to include new feature sets. Managed server assets for multiple product lines. System design to consolidate multiple heterogeneous environments into more homogeneous environments. Deployment, maintenance, security, and backup for existing systems. Wrangling many tens of systems using configuration management software.

Maintaining existing systems for modx.com and legacy systems for MODX Cloud. Planning and implementing systems to replace legacy ones. Developing replacement middleware products for existing problematic ones. Answering tickets and working with customers to meet their needs. All-around problem solver and Winston Wolf.

FireHost is a managed hosting provider for Linux and Windows systems that specializes in high-security solutions such as PCI or HIPAA compliance.Worked support ticket queue, interfacing directly with customers across ticket responses, live chats, and phone calls. Problem resolution for customers' Linux and Windows systems, mostly hosting issues but some more exotic problems. Extensive work with Vmware Vsphere 4/5, Dell Compellant Storage, Salesforce, Nagios, ScienceLogic EM7. Wrote scripts to rapidly troubleshoot common issues such as root partition full, out of memory conditions, lost passwords, etc.Specialized in advanced topics such as:- Rapid response to downtime events (<10 min)- Ruby deployments & troubleshooting- Tomcat deployments & troubleshooting- cPanel & Plesk Subject Matter Expert

Systems administrator, programmer, consultant, and all around problem solver.- Brought unmaintained systems up to date on latest version of Debian Squeeze and 3rd party PPAs. Deployed comprehensive security policy and advanced firewall techniques to protect those systems. Deployed puppet through git versioning system to reduce long-term maintenance workload.- Planned and implemented migration of four major services and their platforms to a different server vendor. Published documentation, groundwork testing on each move, maintenance windows at night, minimal impact to running operations.- Designed and implemented infrastructure to support a cloud product based upon MODX. Strict security policies, chrooted jails for users, busybox, chrooted nginx, and countless special sauce scripts.- Consulting on advanced systems administration techniques to clients operating a myriad of web servers, languages, and related technologies. Troubleshoot misconfigurations, improving system performance, security/hardening, high availability, database replication, load balancing, and other.

Developed middleware to drastically improve productivity and simplify workflow. Administered an 8-node Red Hat Enterprise Linux cluster for petroleum reservoir simulations. On-call Excel and Access guru and part time IT support.

Developed three different websites for the student organization using Flash, PHP, and MySQL. Designed artwork and layouts for advertisements and a t-shirt.

Developed a custom web software based on php and mysql for a nation-wide program targetted at college students.